First major U.S. bout with terrorism: German submarines

decide, at first selectively, to focus on neutral vessels, under the theory that all cargo directed to Great Britain was war materiel.

For example, the luxury liner, Lusitania, which sailed from New York bound for England and secretly carrying munitions, was torpedoed on May 7, 1915, with the taking of 1,198 lives, including 128 Americans, many women and children. After remonstration from President Woodrow Wilson, Germany apologized and provided money damages but would not commit to abandoning the practice.

Again, in March 1916, a German U-boat sank the French passenger ship, the Sussex, killing more Americans. And although Wilson threatened to break off diplomatic relations, the German high command agreed not to sink neutral ships “without warning and without saving human lives.” By late January 1917, however, it was clear to the German military that Britain’s supplies of food were limited to a few weeks. With its total of 105 U-boats, it believed it could defeat the Allies before the United States could enter the war.

But Wilson had an enormous problem in dealing with Germany’s declaration of unrestricted submarine warfare. He had narrowly won re-election in 1916 by the slogan that he had kept the nation out of the European war and prided himself as a former professor of political science on his diplomatic skills, believing that he could negotiate peace between the warring sides. So although he severed diplomatic relations with Germany, American civilian lives continued to be lost on the high seas.

Earlier in the year British naval intelligence had intercepted and decrypted a telegram sent by the German minister, Arthur Zimmerman, to Mexican high officials to the effect that Mexico’s help in defeating the United States would guarantee a return of territory lost in the mid-19th century war with America. With the British recognizing Wilson’s hesitation to enteri the war, the telegram was eventually forwarded to the president, then to the press.

Obviously helping to turn public opinion in favor of American entry, the Zimmerman telegram still didn’t move Wilson to urge Congress to pass a war resolution. That wouldn’t come for several weeks later. The reason, again, was Wilson’s hope that Germany would negotiate with the United States. Instead, Germany continued its unrestricted submarine warfare, with Wilson finally recognizing what has been sine qua non in American policy in recent years. First, he was the first president to use the term. “campaign of terror” to describe Germany’s wholly unlawful and immoral acts.

And second, he was the first to stress that the United States wiould not equivocate with terrorists.